Saturday, January 10, 2009

Saturday Morning In The Dark

Good friend Tink, (she's been mobile blogging today) spent the night here so she could get out for the super low tide this morning. I had laid my clothes out so that I could get ready in a hurry. Jeans and a long sleeve sweatshirt, which turned out to be exactly the right amount of clothing to keep me warm enough. We were up and out by 4:30 and it only took us about 15 minutes to get out to the Sanibel side of Blind Pass.

It was dark, but the full moon helped light the way. We had lights and those helped us find a path to take us to the part of the beach we wanted to explore. We went straight out from the parking area and we were really surprised to see so much of the sand exposed. Now we got excited, expecting to find some great stuff! There were already a couple of lights down a little way from us. A couple people were WAY out on a sandbar. We walked out as far as we could and then started going left toward the area where the big outflow water pipes ended.

I looked over toward Tink and she was bent over looking at something for a while. I went over to see what she had found, and it was just a few sea urchins. I believe if I remember Tink's statement correctly, it was....."And we got up in the middle of the night for this"? "What a WASTE of a great, low tide"! Boy, was she right! There were lots of live Van Henning's Cockles, one big white whelk that was also alive, and a few other small arks etc scattered around.

We looked all around the outflow pipes, that were not running. By looking carefully through lots of broken shells etc, I did have a couple pockets full when we left, but nothing great. There wasn't anything on the Captiva side either, just part of the shells that were left from yesterday.

We were probably there a little over 2 hours. When we first got there, the moon was white and making a reflection on the water. The longer we stayed, the more orange it became as it went down. The sun was coming up in the opposite direction, making the sky gradually change into a bright pink color.

We thought we would go from there to a West Gulf Beach and then to the Lighthouse Beach, exploring those areas too. But, just as we left, we got a phone call from two friends who had been to the Lighthouse Beach and they said it looked like someone had vacuumed up all the shells leaving nothing there. Other friends were staying on West Gulf Beach and they didn't find much of anything, except live shells. So, we gave it up for the day.

After a nap and lunch at Jerry's, and a little shopping, Tink decided that she would drive over to Algiers Beach to take a long walk and check for shells there. She hasn't returned yet.

Note: Still haven't heard anything from 'Alice N Wonderland'. They must be keeping busy shelling or running from one beach to another, like the rest of us. :-)

Another friend, Chris has been blogging from here too.


























9 comments:

Melli said...

Awww... how disappointing! Such excitement over the low LOW tide... and then nothin'. Dang! I do remember once as a kid finding one of those big conch shells with the critter still in it! We had NO respect! We took it home and boiled him out so we could have the shell! HEY! Don't blame me - I was only maybe 6! And I thought that critter was YUCKY! But it obviously left an impression on me...

George said...

You might not have gotten any shells early in the morning, but the pictures of moon and sunrise made it worthwhile (at least for me!).

J said...

Can you here me whining all the way from LSL...My Woo hoo is now Boo hoo.....hahaha

I started organizing my shells last night...that made it worse! I found a scotch bonnet like that with one little hole....mine has a little gray on it....dug it up with the "CLAW" How exciting Gary! Did Gary & Kim do the happy dance when you found the Cats Paws! I would have :)

Hope "D" is finding good stuff tooooo!

Emily said...

Hey, I have a great idea!

What if you let me, my husband and two sweet daughters move in with you, and we will go out at 4:30 in the morning and fetch shells for you!

That way you can stay in your warm cozy bed :)

Sounds great to me!
hahaha

gpc said...

I love those tides, shells or not -- I was so envious of you shellers when I heard that last night was the biggest full moon of the entire 2009 year! Sorry it didn't pull in more shells -- but maybe they'll get there today!

Dave said...

Hi Tootie,
It's been a long time since I visited Sanibel. I've heard that since the hurricanes wiped out a lot of the vegetation, the birds are sparse.
One day, we'll be back!
Dave

MariBy said...

Lovely pics Tootie...especially the ones of the moon on the water.

Sorry it wasn't better shelling :(

Jacque said...

I miss it so much already!

A said...
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